Miracles do happen; the Ottawa Redblacks play for real

Eight years ago, if someone had sketched this scenario it would have been greeted with howls of laughter.

Ottawa would return to the CFL. No, really. The franchise that was run into the ground not once but twice (1996 and 2005), would return with deep-pocketed local ownership, would play in a brand new stadium at Lansdowne Park, joining a suddenly trendy CFL swimming in TV revenue.

Wait, there’s more. Pencil in a star quarterback like Henry Burris to lead the offence. No Art Schlichter or Dan Crowley this time.

Laugh not. It has all come to pass. In due time.

It would take years for a lasting Lansdowne Park development plan – one that included a sports facility to house CFL football, NASL soccer and the OHL Ottawa 67’s. At this moment, workers are furiously tending to construction details on a TD Place park racing toward the Redblacks July 18 opener.

Before then, it’s game day in Winnipeg, the first regular season CFL game in nine years to involve an Ottawa team. Joe Paopao, one of the best people in this football business, was the head coach then. Now, it’s Rick Campbell (son of CFL icon Hugh Campbell), who will set up on the sidelines as Burris leads the team into action against the Blue Bombers.

Up in the press box at Investors Group Field (today’s stadium names are steeped in romance, aren’t they?), Redblacks president Jeff Hunt will be looking on, the game representing a respite from the frantic daily work of preparing for July 18.

“To be honest, I don’t even know yet how I’m going to feel,” Hunt says. “Until I’m actually in the moment, I don’t know. I imagine it will be – excitement, and pride, and God knows what other emotion.”

Hunt, of course, is front man and partner in the Ottawa Sports and Entertainment Group (OSEG) that owns and operates the Redblacks, Fury and 67’s.

Considering the scorched earth left by the recent football ownerships of the Rough Riders and Renegades, it was one small miracle to get the CFL back here for a third go, a larger miracle to see city hall approve the Lansdowne plan. It’s easy to forget now the dark days when it seemed the development might never break ground, the team forever in limbo as a CFL “conditional franchise.”

“A lot of days I wondered if this day would come,” says Hunt, on the eve of the Redblacks road opener. “Through the whole process, there were times I thought this thing would never come together. Luckily, there were more days when I thought it would.”

Campbell, quarterback Burris and a few other players flew early to Winnipeg for media availability there, leaving offensive co-ordinator Mike Gibson to walk the Redblacks through a final practice session in Ottawa before game one.

Gibson has been around long enough that he coached against those Renegades teams. He gets the significance of Ottawa’s football renaissance.

“It’s very exciting, I’m very proud to be here, Gibson said. “I think they made a great choice in Rick Campbell as the head coach. Rick is very mild-mannered, he’s been waiting for this opportunity for a long time. And I think he’s put together a great staff.

“I’ve been around a while, and anytime you get a chance to start something new it’s exciting. We’re a much better football team today than we were when we got to Carleton three weeks ago. We’re going to be better three weeks from now.”

About that . . . this is no ordinary expansion team. Unlike past dispersal drafts, the Redblacks had an opportunity to select legitimate CFL players. With an astute GM in Marcel Desjardins, they went out and signed Burris as a free agent. Instantly, Ottawa had one of the CFL’s best and most experienced quarterbacks in a quarterback-driven league. He will be tested out of the gate. The Bombers put a beating on the Toronto Argos in week one, while the Redblacks had a bye week.

Making Burris more dangerous is a talented running back named Chevon Walker, formerly of the Hamilton Tiger-Cats. In a pre-season romp over the Montreal Alouettes, Walker ran for three touchdowns.

He’s ready to get it going for real. Ottawa’s first game.

“You can get goosebumps thinking about it, but it’s here now,” Walker says. “Offence, defence, special teams, we feel confident and ready to go. Go out and make plays.”

Count Walker among those who have been trained not think of this program as a first-year exercise.

Expansion team?

“Oh, no, man,” Walker says. “That was over in December.”

As a nation looks on, Ottawa is back in the CFL, smiling Henry behind centre. The team, and the franchise, are in good hands.

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